


why waiting in the car is a good (but sometimes also a bad) idea

by pwrofbauer



Category: Constantine (2005)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-25
Updated: 2011-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-28 02:18:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/302656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pwrofbauer/pseuds/pwrofbauer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pre-movie snapshot piece. John/Chas (sort of one-sided) centric. Contains a heck of a lot of swearing and a bit of smut (but not much) as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	why waiting in the car is a good (but sometimes also a bad) idea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Amethyst Shard (AmethystShard)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmethystShard/gifts).



> Written as a Treat for Yuletide. I hope you enjoy, Amethyst Shard! :D

He always has to sit in the car.

And he fucking _hates_ sitting in the goddamn car, because sitting in the car means that he can’t do shit if things go wrong -- and they almost always go wrong in some way, shape, or form.

Last week, it was the demon bitch in South Central; this week, he’s sitting in the cab outside a shitty apartment building in Silver Lake, ignoring the stares he’s getting from the ghetto-fabulous woman (she’s a hooker, he’s pretty sure of it) standing in the alcove.

And as a bonus? It’s raining. And if there’s anything he hates more than sitting in the car, waiting? It’s sitting in the car in the goddamn pouring rain, windows fogged up and he can’t see for shit.

Not like it would do him any good. John never wants him to come inside. Yeah, it’s dangerous, and he knows that, but there’s a reason that he spends his free time driving around a chain-smoking exorcism professional -- he wants to _learn_. It’s not even that this stuff is merely interesting to him (because if that was the case, John would tell him to hit the fucking road, he’s sure of it) but it’s more that he wants to learn so when the big bad bang happens and it all goes to hell, he’ll be able to take care of himself and maybe even lend a hand for the good guys, too.

(Chas smirks to himself, at the thought of John Constantine being classified as a ‘good guy’.)

He’s contemplating taking a nap, and has gone as far as to pull his cap down over his eyes, when the back door jerks open behind his head. He swears under his breath and turns around to glare at John, but freezes when he sees the deep gash across the older man’s forehead and the pallor of his skin; he looks like he’s been coated in ashes.

“Jesus _Christ_ , what the fuck--”

“Oh, that was nothing near holy. Go.”

“John--”

“I said _go_.”

The door slams shut and Chas jams the keys into the ignition, hurriedly putting the cab into gear and peeling out of the parking lot. He gets four blocks away from the apartment building before he even thinks to ask where he should be going; he glances into the rearview mirror and realizes that John is slumped against the window with his eyes squeezed shut and a lit cigarette dropping ash onto his tie.

Chas swallows his heart down out of his throat and mashes down on the accelerator, heading for home.

(John’s home, not his.)

Constantine barely has enough strength to get them past the wards in the hallway and on the front door before they stagger into the apartment; Chas drops him onto the couch and immediately goes to the bathroom for the first aid kit, cursing beneath his breath at the lack of usable supplies he’s able to find.

“I can feel you in there.”

Momentarily thrown (until he remembers -- the cursing, John can _feel_ the cursing) Chas pauses, before he keeps searching. He can hear John trying to move off of the couch so he decides to end this futile search, grabbing a box of Band-Aids and some rubbing alcohol on his way back into the living room. “I’ll get the holy water,” he says.

“ _Don’t_ you dare,” John growls. “Just get me a beer.”

Chas rolls his eyes and drops the Band-Aids box on the coffee table. “You’re not getting a beer.” He sets the rubbing alcohol down beside the box and then goes to find a towel out of the kitchen. And some food -- the man has to eat, especially after whatever the fuck just happened that he _missed out on yet again_ because he was stuck sitting in the car -- or maybe some coffee.

He nearly drops a box of granola bars on the counter when he hears Constantine yell in pain; he’s tripping over his own feet to get around the counter and into the other room.

(John’s bleeding.)

There’s blood on the cushion of the couch -- from the gash across his forehead -- but the blood on the white dress shirt that John is struggling to get off his body is a new development. Chas curses, then apologizes, as he clears the coffee table and starts working on the buttons of John’s shirt.

“S’just a scratch.”

“That,” Chas shoves the shirt open, exposing the wound -- are those _claw marks_ \-- to the air. “That is _not_ a scratch. What the fuck _was_ that in there, John?”

“Jus’ a little bitty thing. Demon.”

“What, a Tyrannosaurus demon? Christ--”

“Would you _stop_ with the fucking _Christ_ bullshit already?!” John growls out the words and reaches for the pack of Silk Cuts on the arm of the couch. “There was nothing holy about that piece of sulfur-sucking shit, absolutely _nothing_.”

“You should have let me come in and help,” Chas comments, reaching for the bottle of alcohol on the table to douse the hand towel with it. “I could have done something.”

“Yeah, you could’ve.” The cigarette flares to life without John even reaching for his lighter -- though who knows if the damn thing is still even in the pocket of his trench at this point -- and a curl of smoke fills the gap between them. “You could’ve ended up with your nutsack in your throat and your guts on the carpet, that’s what you could’ve done.”

“I’m not _useless_ , John--”

“No, you’re _not_ fucking useless, Chas.” Constantine scowls at him. “You’re the one who waits in the fucking car until I get back, because when I get back to the car, I need us to fucking _go_ , you understand? I need us to get the fuck out of wherever we are and you’re the driver, so you wait in the car.”

Chas gets it. He doesn’t like it but he gets it, so he nods.

“Now help me get this shirt off.”

Chas leans in and pushes the cotton off of John’s shoulders, breathing in the heavy stink of sweat, smoke, and sulfur on the older man’s skin. His fingertips linger for the most fleeting of moments against the tattooed lines at the base of Constantine’s neck.

(That daring hint of a pause is all it takes for John to drop his cigarette onto the coffee table -- it misses the ashtray, but it doesn’t make it to the hardwood floorboards -- and fist his hand into Chas’s shirt at the collar. Their mouths meet in a collision that’s hard enough to nearly knock teeth together but Chas is so stunned by the sudden surge of energy he feels crackle down his spine that he barely notices the fact that his lip is split and bleeding.)

Chas drops his hand to John’s ribcage, fingers pressing against the open wound to try to stem the bleeding; when John groans into his mouth at the touch, he feels _useless_ to do anything but respond in kind.

John snaps his head back and hisses a half-second later, and the moment is broken.

“Get me my fuckin’ smokes, will you?”

“Yeah.”

(Later, Chas will shove John back against the couch and straddle his lap, and John will be just drunk enough on the afterglow of the exorcism and the fight from that afternoon that he’ll think putting his mouth back against that of his driver is an _excellent_ idea. But that will come after Chas has put fifteen stitches into John’s side, and fed him half an order of sweet and sour chicken and a bottle of water.)

“Appreciate it.”

Chas smiles and moves to go grab another pack of cigarettes off the kitchen counter -- it may not be standing at John’s shoulder with a cross and a bible in his hands, but if he needs to drive the fucking car to be useful, then he’s going to drive (and wait in, for hours upon hours) the fucking car.


End file.
